


The Man in the Clouds

by maplewix (orphan_account)



Series: Samifer Fairy Tales [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, M/M, Storms, living in the clouds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-18
Updated: 2014-04-18
Packaged: 2018-01-19 21:34:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1484890
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/maplewix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was common knowledge among the people of the town that there was a man who lived on top of the clouds, just above and to the left of Master Bobby Singer’s farms.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Man in the Clouds

**Author's Note:**

> Based on [this prompt](http://yeahwriters.tumblr.com/post/63421083178).

It was common knowledge among the people of the town that there was a man who lived on top of the clouds, just above and to the left of Master Bobby Singer’s farms. When it rained, the lovely lady Jo swore she could hear him crying. 

Sam had always thought that the man’s tears sounded less like weeping and more like screaming. 

The children loved to make a game of trying to climb the clouds. No parent’s warnings could stop them from scrambling up the trees to the very tops, straining to catch a glimpse of the man’s face. Sam’s childhood friend Ruby claimed to have seen him once. 

"He had eyes like icicles right before they fall and impale you," she insisted. 

Sam believed her, but the other children liked to ridicule her for her claim. 

On foggy mornings, Sam liked to sneak out and climb the hills to see if he could get high enough up to see over the fog. He always hoped with a strange, creeping sense of importance, that the man might be waiting for him there. 

The closest he ever got was seeing footprints pressed into the condensation, but when Sam tried to jump onto a cloud, he crashed to the ground and broke his wrist. 

He wasn’t allowed out in the mornings for a month after that. 

When Sam grew up, the other children slowly lost interest in finding the man in the clouds. Sometimes they teased Sam for the way he would go out in the rain to stare up at the sky, but Ruby was a fierce friend, and everyone knew to be wary of any threats of biting she gave. Her teeth were sharp. Sometimes Sam caught people muttering to each other about her, wondering if she was even human. (Sam thought he had seen her eyes change color one or twice. He never said anything.) 

One day when Sam was fifteen a storm rolled in that Bobby Singer and Mistress Harvelle had been predicting for days. Sam felt drawn to the rain and the winds and the sound of tree branches breaking. He crept out in the night and climbed a tree, feeling inexorably pulled to the highest branches. The bark was slick and the tree shook and shuddered like it planned to crack right down the center. He had grown too big for the thinnest branches, but he persevered, desperate to feel the wind smash across his face.

"SAM!" 

His brother Dean stood at the base of the tree, wild-eyed and furious. “Get down from there!” Dean shouted. 

"I can’t," Sam called back. "He needs me!" 

He didn’t know where that thought had come from, only that it was the truest thing he’d ever spoken. Dean’s mouth was forming curses and he swung himself up into the tree, clearly planning on coming to get Sam. 

 _Sam_. 

The wind whispered his name.  _Sam. Sam._

"Where are you?" he asked, swaying where he clutched the trunk of the tree. "I’m here—where are you?" 

"Sam!" Dean wasn’t too far below him now. The wind gusted, forcing Sam flat against the tree. He clung on as hard as he could. 

The branch he was standing on began to crack. The wind went still for a moment before it suddenly roared down with a scream. 

There was nothing but air beneath Sam’s feet. 

 

* * *

 

He woke slowly. 

The first thing he felt was the cold. 

He became aware next that he was also soaking wet, and also that he could feel arms around him. 

"Dean?" 

He opened his eyes and met a gaze that scorched into his very soul. 

"You’re the man on the cloud," Sam said hoarsely.  

"Lucifer," the man corrected. "I’ve been waiting for you." 

Sam tried to sit up, but his feet went right through the clouds. He leaned back, closer to Lucifer. 

"You can’t touch the clouds like I can," Lucifer explained. "I have to hold you up." 

Sam, staring down at where his leg faded into the cloud, instantly resolved not to anger him. 

"What am I doing here?" he asked. 

"You are here because we were made for each other," Lucifer said simply. "We have always been meant to complete each other." 

"What does that mean?" Sam hadn’t meant for his voice to shake, but it did. 

"It means nothing unless you let it," Lucifer said, and looked away. "You have no obligation to spend any time with me if you would rather return to your brother." 

Sam stared out across the empty expanse. “How long have you been here?” 

"Longer than the existence of thought." 

Sam tried to imagine that, and was hit by a feeling of loneliness so intense that for a second he couldn’t breathe. 

"What do you want from me?" His voice ached. 

Lucifer slowly, hesitantly ran a hand through Sam’s hair. “I want you to stay with me,” he said softly. “But right now I want you to understand what that would mean.” 

"I would never go home." Sam realized everything Lucifer wasn’t saying in an instant, as if they didn’t need to speak to understand each other. "I would stay here with you forever." 

"Let me show you my world," Lucifer pleaded, and Sam took his hand in silent acquiescence. 

They walked through the clouds. Lucifer formed ice and water droplets out of the air and hung them like a crown from Sam’s hair with an easy smile, as if it meant nothing, as if Sam couldn’t feel how deeply Lucifer loved him. 

They played with snow and rain, sending gentle breezes and healing showers down on Sam’s little town, ravaged by the previous night’s storm. Lucifer murmured hints of stories about the beginning of the world. He told him about the first family to settle the town beneath them, and he made Sam laugh when he taught Sam how to watch the people below by showing him Bobby’s dreadful attempts to woo Mistress Harvelle. 

Sam also saw Dean’s fear and his desperate search for his little brother, and he was quiet for a long time after that. 

"How long do I have to decide?" he asked at last. 

"We have a day here together," Lucifer said. "After that you’ll have one more chance to return here in a year from today. There’s time." 

Sam nodded and pressed his face into Lucifer’s neck. He heard the man inhale sharply. 

"What are you?" he asked. 

Lucifer placed a hand on the back of Sam’s neck, comforting. “I’m an angel,” he said. 

Sam nodded into Lucifer’s cold skin. 

"Give me a year," he whispered at last. "I’ll come back to you then, and we’ll have eternity together. But I have to say goodbye." 

Lucifer raised Sam’s head and pressed a kiss to his forehead. “Of course,” he promised. “I’ll send you home.” 

"I’ll come back," Sam insisted. "I swear I will." 

"I believe you," Lucifer said, but there was heartbreak in his voice. "Until then, Sam." 

"Goodbye," Sam said, and felt himself slip from Lucifer’s grasp. The winds bore him down gently, leaving him on a field of grass just outside the village. 

"I love you," he whispered. Wind ruffled his hair. 

 _Sam_. 

He set off home.


End file.
